Blood: An Epic History of Medicine and Commerce - Douglas Starr

Named one of the best books of 1998 by Publishers Weekly, Booklist and Library Journal, the award-winning definitive history of the essence of life itself--blood--returns in trade paperback. \n \nPowerfully involving narrative and incisive detail, clarity and inherent drama: Blood offers in abundance the qualities that define the best popular science writing. Here is the sweeping story of a substance that has been feared, revered, mythologized, and used in magic and medicine from earliest times--a substance that has become the center of a huge, secretive, and often dangerous worldwide commerce.\n \nWinner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, Blood was described by judges as a gripping page-turner, a significant contribution to the history of medicine and technology and a cautionary tale. Meticulously reported and exhaustively documented.\n